Electronic control dashboard capable of displaying fitness age

ABSTRACT

An electronic control dashboard capable of displaying fitness age, comprising an operating interface disposed at an end surface of the electronic control dashboard. A microprocessor and related circuit connecting terminals are installed in the electronic control dashboard for electrically conducting a circuit to control the operation of a fitness equipment. The operating interface further comprises a fitness age display area for displaying a message transmitted from a heartbeat detector, such that after the specific user completes an exercise session, the microprocessor immediately converts the user&#39;s recovery heart rate into a fitness age and displays the fitness age at the fitness age display area. Moreover, a weight difference of the specific user or an effective exercise heart rate measured during the whole exercise process can be used as parameters for the conversion of the fitness age.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Fields of the Invention

The present invention relates to an electronic control dashboard, and more particularly to the electronic control dashboard having a fitness age display area for displaying a specific exerciser's fitness effect accurately, as to achieve the effects of managing and maintaining the specific user's best physiological conditions in a long term according to the specific exercisers body type and exercise purposes.

2. Description of the Related Art

As people nowadays already profoundly know the relation and importance of diets, exercises and physiological changes (including body weight, heartbeat, blood pressure, and body fat, etc), the temptation of delicious food and personal laziness have substantial effects on their failure of controlling their diets. Of course, they will not remind themselves for maintaining good exercise habits, and thus resulting in declined physiological conditions from the ideal health conditions, or even finding themselves in a sick condition that requires medical assistance. Until then, people are alerted of the necessity of controlling their diets and maintaining good exercise habits.

However, when we want to control our diet and establish the habit of managing our body weight, we find that there is no related accessory equipment or instrument to assist, remind or record our physiological change and calorie consumption, so that we know the change of our physiological change (particularly an increase of body weight) after an improper food intake takes place, and then we start doing exercises depending on the physiological changes (particularly doing all kinds of exercises blindly to attempt recovering the ideal physiological conditions).

As to most people, the effect of controlling diets and doing exercises voluntarily is usually not too good, and even brings frustrations that discourage people to keep going. After all, the way of controlling diets and doing exercises compulsorily without plans fails to increase our confidence and determination of carrying out the diet control and the exercise plan. At the beginning when the effect is low, people have doubts about the necessity of continuing their exercise and careful selection of food, and may give up and stop controlling their diets or doing exercises anymore, which may jeopardize their health.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Therefore, it is a primary objective of the present invention to provide a special electronic control dashboard operated with a heartbeat detector to detect data of an actual recovery heart rate. The electronic control dashboard has a built-in microprocessor provided for accurately converting the data and displaying a specific user's exercise effect of each time in terms of a simple numeric value of fitness age directly in a fitness age display area of the electronic control dashboard. Therefore, users can know about their current physical conditions and the exercise results of previous time, and the invention can achieve additional effects of encouraging and urging the users to maintain a good exercise habit.

Another objective of the present invention is to improve the accuracy of the fitness age value by adding a weight difference of the specific user or an effective exercise heart rate measured during the whole exercising process into parameters used for the conversion of the fitness age.

According to the invention, an electronic control dashboard capable of displaying fitness age comprises an operating interface disposed at an end surface of the electronic control dashboard and provided for inputting a specific user's basic physiological parameters, and a microprocessor and related circuit connecting terminals installed in the electronic control dashboard for electrically conducting a circuit to control a main control mechanism operated by a fitness equipment. The operating interface further comprises a fitness age display area for displaying a message transmitted from a heartbeat detector. Therefore, after the specific user completes an exercise of a stage, the microprocessor immediately converts the user's recovery heart rate into a fitness age and displays the fitness age at the fitness age display area.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accomplishment of this and other objects of the invention will become apparent from the following description and its accompanying drawings of which:

FIG. 1 is a schematic view of an electronic control dashboard in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention; and

FIG. 2 is a schematic view of an electronic control dashboard applied to a fitness equipment in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

Before the technical characteristics of the present invention are described, the following terminologies are defined first.

The international standard body mass index (BMI) refers to BMI=weight (kg)/height (m²) which serves as a standard for determining a fat or thin person, and the BMI value generally falls within a range of 22˜24 which is considered as an ideal body weight.

The basal metabolic rate (BMR) refers to the minimum amount of energy required for maintaining life when a human body is situated at an inactive condition. In addition, the basal metabolic rate increases with age, decreases with body weight, and increases with the increase of muscles.

The heart rate range is listed in the following table (adapted from the American College of Sports and Medicine, ACSM):

Maximum heartbeat rate per minute of each person=220−age

Heartbeat Objective of Exercise 50~60% × Maximum heartbeat rate Maintaining health 60~70% × Maximum heartbeat rate Controlling body weight 70~80% × Maximum heartbeat rate Aerobic training 80~100% × Maximum heartbeat rate Match training

In short, when our heartbeat is maintained at “50˜60%×Maximum heartbeat rate”, which is equivalent to our general lifestyle, and the calorie consumption of our body is equivalent to the basal metabolic rate. When our heartbeat is maintained above “60%×Maximum heartbeat rate”, the exercise condition is reached, and the calorie consumption of our body is equal to the sum of exercise consumption and the basal metabolic rate. In other words, the faster the heartbeat, the greater is the calorie consumption. Therefore, if the heartbeat value is maintained at the exercise condition continuously, the inventor of the present invention specifically categorizes it as the “effective heartbeat range”.

The heartbeat recovery rate refers to the heart's ability to return the heartbeat value from a higher value to a normal value per unit time after physical activity. In general, the faster the heartbeat value returning to its normal value, the better is our physical function.

The technical characteristics and measures of the present invention will become apparent by the detailed description of a preferred embodiment and the illustration of related drawings as follows.

With reference to FIGS. 1 and 2 for schematic views of an electronic control dashboard and its application in a fitness equipment in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention respectively, the electronic control dashboard 10 comprises an operating interface 12 disposed at an end surface 11 of the electronic control dashboard 10 and provided for inputting a specific user's physiological parameters (such as age, sex, height and weight), a microprocessor (not shown in the figure) and related circuit connecting terminals (not shown in the figure) installed in the electronic control dashboard 10 and provided for electrically conducting a circuit and controlling a main control mechanism operated by a fitness equipment 20. The operating interface 12 further comprises a fitness age display area 13 for displaying a message transmitted from a heartbeat detector 14. After the specific user completes an exercise of a stage, the microprocessor immediately converts the user's recovery heart rate into a fitness age and displays the fitness age at the fitness age display area 13.

It is noteworthy that the higher the recovery heart rate, the better are the physiological mechanism and the physical ability. and the better is the fitness age, and vice versa.

In a computing software program of the microprocessor, an effective fitness heart rate can be added and used as a conversion parameter. Since the fitness heart rate of some specific exercisers may not reach the aforementioned effective fitness heart rate during their exercise (such as slow stepping), therefore the finally converted fitness age may not be true. However, this parameter added into the program can urge specific users to do an effective exercise to achieve the required exercise and training effects.

In the computing software program of the microprocessor, a weight difference can be added and used as a conversion parameter. Therefore, the operating interface 12 of the electronic control dashboard 10 can be used for inputting the specific user's height and weight. The microprocessor automatically computes the specific user's weight difference value from the specific user's height and weight according to the international standard weight value (BMI). Such weight difference value is intended for truly reflecting the specific user's type of build such as slightly fat, slightly thin, excessively thin or excessive fat. Therefore, related numeric values that fit the specific user most can be computed according to the specific user's type of build and requirements. These numeric values are further used together with the conversion of the recovery heart rate to obtain and display a more accurate fitness age more accurately. Specific users can manage and maintain their best physiological conditions in a long term according to their type of build and exercise purposes (such as weight control, aerobic training or competition training).

In general, the heartbeat detector 14 is fixed onto an exerciser's body for measuring the exerciser's pulse, so that related measurement data can be transmitted successfully to the microprocessor of the electronic control dashboard 10 via a cable or wireless transmission technology.

To facilitate users to manage their exercise effects and access and store related exercise data, cable and wireless transmission modules (not shown in the figure) are installed in the electronic control dashboard 10 to upload and download related information from the microprocessor to a portable mobile device such as a computer, a tablet PC, a smart mobile communication device or a personal digital assistant (PDA).

Many changes and modifications in the above-described embodiments of the invention can, of course, be carried out without departing from the scope thereof. Accordingly, to promote the progress in science and the useful arts, the invention is disclosed and is intended to be limited only by the scope of the appended claims. 

What is claimed is:
 1. An electronic control dashboard capable of displaying fitness age, comprising an operating interface disposed at an end surface of the electronic control dashboard and provided for inputting a specific user's basic physiological parameters, and a microprocessor and related circuit connecting terminals installed in the electronic control dashboard for electrically conducting a circuit to control a main control mechanism operated by a fitness equipment, wherein the operating interface further comprises a fitness age display area for displaying a message transmitted from a heartbeat detector, such that after the specific user completes an exercise of a stage, the microprocessor immediately converts the user's recovery heart rate into a fitness age and displays the fitness age at the fitness age display area.
 2. The electronic control dashboard capable of displaying fitness age according to claim 1, further comprising an effective exercise heart rate added into a computing software program of the microprocessor and used as a conversion parameter.
 3. The electronic control dashboard capable of displaying fitness age according to claim 1, further comprising a weight difference added into a computing software program of the microprocessor and used as a conversion parameter.
 4. The electronic control dashboard capable of displaying fitness age according to claim 1, further comprising an effective exercise heart rate and a weight difference added into a computing software program of the microprocessor and used as a conversion parameter.
 5. The electronic control dashboard capable of displaying fitness age according to claim 1, wherein the related measurement data obtained by the heartbeat detector are transmitted to the microprocessor of the electronic control dashboard 10 via a cable or wireless transmission technology.
 6. The electronic control dashboard capable of displaying fitness age according to claim 1, wherein cable and wireless transmission modules are installed in the electronic control dashboard 10 to upload and download related information from the microprocessor to a portable mobile device such as a computer, a tablet PC, a smart mobile communication device or a personal digital assistant (PDA). 